swancon 2008

I’m not much of one for con reports these days, partly because the pictures tell the thousand words, etc etc, but mostly because all the really entertaining stuff that went down over the Easter long weekend is far too rude, crude and generally offensive to repeat without hurting feelings, naming names and pointing fingers. So I’m not gonna. The con itself had a few comedy of errors aspects to it. The absolute highlight of it all for me was GOH Rob Shearman. About 10 of us fell completely in love with him. I believe

actually kidnapped him this afternoon. She and I would have had a scragfight over him for sure if my dragon and I didn’t have to fly back home to the classy side of the continent at 1am this morning. Full set of photos here. And oh yeah, I won a Ditmar for my novella ‘A Lady of Adestan’ which was originally published in Orb magazine. My acceptance speech was classy (I grinned and shouted out I beat Garth Nix!). Physically, the award itself is rather dowdy. Come on guys, normally you get the winner’s names engraved on statues. You don’t print them out on itty bits of cardboard, cut them out & make the winners  glue them  on to the plaques themselves fer fuck’s sake…


Tehani Wessely, Rob Shearman, Kathryn Linge & Alisa Krasnostein.

Andy Macrae

Karl Schraeder, Robin Pen, Ken Macleod, Sean Williams & Jonathan Strahan

The Ditmars are now unofficially known as the Krazzies. Seeing as Alisa wins most of them.

yeah, I really do have a dragon!

28 Comments

  1. I like the award itself, but it is a little sad that the “plaque” is a do-it-yourself glue-on bit of paper. I’m going and getting a little metal plaque engraved and stuck on mine.

  2. I’m sorry about the plaques, I didn’t realise they were paper till way too late, which I was seriously unimpressed with. I’m also sorry that I didn’t have them on there ready – it’s one of the things that I fell down on and I’m sincerely sorry. I went with someone to make these who reportedly had made them in the past and knew the deal, but that whole aspect of it was unexpectedly stressful as opposed to being easier. I’m a little boggled by it all still.

    • Don’t worry, Ju. You did a fab job of managing all the things that could be managed. We’re gonna get our own engraved plates done & stick em on.

      • I’m really glad to hear that and think it’s a much better idea! πŸ™‚

        Loved seeing you at this con even though I didn’t find time to actually have a real conversation with you πŸ™‚

          • I’m going to click the link when I’m done with the net for a couple of hours so I can dl it (dialup)

            Thank you! πŸ™‚

    • Ta! We were up against each other in the Aurealis awards. He beat me that time but now I’ve got revenge!!!

  3. Hey, Cat. Good to know you survived the trek home. And your dragon. Congrats again on the award and all. It was great to catch up – between parties and launches and stuff! – and now it’s back to planet Workies.

    Ah well. C’est la guerre, ne c’est pas?

    • C’est la guerre, ne c’est pas?

      I don’t speak French but I’m guessing that’s French for we gotta pull our fingers out and get cracking on the Canterbury 2100 stuff?

      It was fab to see you too, darl. I shared that bottle of Tassie wine you gave me with Rob Shearman at Alisa’s place on Monday night.

        • Robin & Toula have this awesomely violent kitten called Milly. It scratched most of the flesh off my right leg over a 5 day visit. So cute.

          • Seriously, that’s my sort of cat. I hadn’t realized exactly how violent my old cat Jones was until after he died. This was the beast that regularly snagged and pulled down vintage posters (including a couple of irreplaceable ones), sliced up a pair of motorcycle boots, and made a nest out of my tablecloth, and all before he was two years old. All that damage, and I’d still do anything to be able to spend one last day with him.

          • Cat

            when I left, Milly was chewing her way through the wallpaper. I tried to abduct her but she wouldn’t get into the bag

          • Good thing, too, because she would have chewed her way through the bag on your drive back home. I don’t even want to think of what would have happened had she gotten loose on a plane.

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